Figurehead

“ He never had a photograph taken, and, when it was his turn to pose in the sketch classes, where the students alternate as models for their fellows, his nervousness was actual suffering. To be looked at meant, for him, to drop his eyes and find his hands in his way—the hands that could paint the finest pictures in Europe!”
“To understand his half-mad conduct, one must understand his half-mad genius. To most men who can command fame, the plaudits of clapping hands are as the incense of triumph. ”

“ Can a class of half a million male adults, whom we may emphatically term all readers, and members of reading families; a class of half a million of the pick of British Artisans; a class of the highest intelligence, and (measured by their wages and numbers) highest in wealth: can we talk of the smallness of the number of readers, and assume to know any thing of this large and influential body? ”

“ Busy men, moreover, are given to detail, and detail fills the eye and ear; men of reflection deal more with principles, and these lie beyond the range of ordinary vision.
The proposition which I here put forward, based on many years of observation and study, is fundamental, and affects, more or less, a wide range of character in every individual. ”

“ After all, the great end of biography is not to be found, as some would seem to imagine, in a series of dates, or in a collection of gossiping anecdotes and table-talk, which, instead of lighting up and vivifying the features, hang as a cloud of dust upon the portrait; but it is to be found in an analysis of human genius, and in the developement of those elements of the mind, to whose varied combinations, and nicely adjusted proportions, the mental habits, and intellectual peculiarities of distinguished men may be readily referred. ”

“ I have, however, great faith in the power of artists to make a figure-head useful as well as ornamental, although I do not know that they have shown a proof of this to-day by making their figure-head deliver a speech, which it is well known figure-heads never do, except on the strictest compulsion. ”

“ At the same time, let it be indelibly fixed in your minds, that when decided character is to be given, that character must be accompanied by correctness of outline, whether it be in painting or in sculpture. Any representation of the human figure, in the higher department of art, wanting these requisites, is, to the feelings of the educated artist, deficient in that, for the loss of which no other excellency can compensate. ”

“ Thus in him I met, for the first time in my life, a figure who was the incarnation of the ideal I had drawn for myself of the great man. This ideal had two sides; talent and character: great capacities and inflexibility. The men of great reputation whom I had met hitherto, artists and scientists, were certainly men richly endowed with talents; but I had never hitherto encountered a personality combining talents with gifts of character. ”

“ How singularly has my way been hedged up in my profession at the very moment when, to human appearance, everything seemed prosperously tending to the accomplishment of my desire in painting a national picture. ”

“ Meanest thou that all these divines, all these exponents of learning, with all their authority, their pomp and pageantry, have erred, and failed to distinguish truth from falsehood? Dost thou, and people like thyself, pretend to have comprehended that which they have not understood?” If numbers and excellence of apparel be regarded as the criterions of learning and truth, the peoples of a bygone age, whom those of today have never surpassed in numbers, magnificence and power, should certainly be accounted a superior and worthier people. ”

“ If a man of this stamp has painted a picture he can be induced to change the whole key, the central circumstance and the principal figure, at the suggestion of a confident critic who is only a pupil in the art of which he is, at least technically, a master. ”

“ Never begin the detail of a figure until you feel sure that every thing is in its right place, and that the general proportions are correct. In the same way, in composition never begin to elaborate the figures until you{324} feel sure that your groups are in their right places and of the proper size.
To return to our subject. I will suppose now that I have got my figures where I want them to be. I can go ahead now in all confidence. I can try various attitudes for my striking and prostrate figures. I can try different modes of giving to Moses the kind of expression I wish him to have. ”

“ Study and reflection enable him, with the aid of experience and of the intuition which genius bestows, but which experience may in a high degree supply, to interpret, to combine, and to supplement given materials. But in the transformation of the conception into the represented character the actor’s functions are really creative; for here he becomes the character by means which belong to his art alone. ”

“ The master has the tranquil face, the serene eye, and the almost smiling lip of one who feels the complacency of knowledge. There is in the complexion of the group an air of mystery, gravity, and scientific solemnity, which inspires reverence and silence. ”

“ If a peer comes into a novel he comes in, not as a coroneted curiosity, but as a man, just as if he were a dentist, or a stockbroker. His rank is an accident; it used to be the essence of his luminous apparition. ”

“ If I tend to stick to figures, perhaps it is because I am excited by figures, all kinds of figures. There is nothing, however, more fascinating than that par­ticular figure, the figure of economic development. ”

“ Great people, all over Europe, sought introductions to him; high personages, incredibly high, and more of them than would ever be known, solemnly sworn as every one was, in such cases, to discretion, high personages made up to him as the one man on the short authentic list likely to give the price. ”

“ A full and thorough study of the great master whose name is the crowning glory of the nineteenth century could scarcely be comprised in ten times the space here allotted to a rapid and imperfect survey of so sublime and inexhaustible a subject. ”

“ Question me about notoriety, Miss Lawton, and no man alive can give you more authentic information as to the method of its creation, its staying power, and its value. But I know not fame! If I died to-morrow I'd die like a dog—so far as memory or renown is concerned. Learn early to distinguish between the sound, noise, and rumor of notoriety and the credit, honor, and excellence of fame! ”

“ The impression which his career and character have made on the vast mass of his countrymen must be sought elsewhere. To a great extent, no doubt, it is due to the peculiar character of his genius, to its varied nature, to the wonderful combination of qualities he possessed, and which rarely reside in the same brain. ”

“ Whether we turn to metaphysics, epistemology, and the other departments of abstract thought, astronomy, physics, or mechanics; whether we turn to medicine, chemistry, philology, geology, physiology or any other of the more modern sciences, or whether we turn to architecture, sculpture, poetry, or painting, the names that really count, the figures that are milestones in the history of these human pursuits—and this is the ultimate criterion—are all names of male performers. ”

“ We will find that almost every influential figure appears on the first list, but that many on the first list do not appear on the second. In other words, some great figures may be passed by or ignored by their immediate times and recognized subsequently as isolated peaks of eminence, much appreciated but little imitated. ”

“ We feel that the men in the higher classes of the scale would be, in the full sense of the word, Great—men whom one would give much to see the faces of but for an instant; and that those in the lower classes of the scale (though none were admitted but who had true merit of some kind) would be very small men, not greatly exciting either reverence or curiosity. ”

“ Who better than the writer of the Essays could have painted a series of miniatures of the courts of Elizabeth and James?
When at last the political upheaval of this century compelled men to leave, whether in histories, or memoirs, or biographies, a record of what they had themselves experienced, the character attained to its full importance and excellence. ”

“ Each student should bring to the class a statement of what he regards as the chief thought in each paper as it comes up,—not the moral of the paper, but the chief end which the writer seems to have in view, the thought which most strongly strikes the reader. ”

“ After an interval of silence, during which he asked whether he might be permitted to close his eyes, he reverted to the question by saying, "You, of course, do not mean that a large head is always a sign of intellectual capacity, and that a small one is not," and on my replying in the negative, he added, "No doubt size has something to do with the quantity or quality of the intellect, but achievement depends upon the emotions!" ”

“ There was too often a paralysis of dulness4 in the old lecture, or, rather, in the old lecturer; and written lectures, like history and fashion in dress, have an inveterate tendency to repeat themselves; but, on the contrary, there was often a wealth of power also in the studied discourse of strong men. Masters bent upon instructing and inspiring—and there were many such—had to penetrate that central secret of literature and spoken utterance—the secret of style. ”

“ But as the wooden figures became more numerous and as no figure could do more than one task, the ragged man had to make figures for the figures and servants for the servants, for as things went on, there had to be more fruit gatherers, more water carriers, more scavengers, more cooks, because the figures had to eat and drink. Thus it came to pass that before long, instead of their being twenty figures for each man, there were sixty or seventy, with new ones coming from the old man’s knife every day. ”

“ Each phial had a label recording the name of the person whose renown it contained, the means by which he had become famous, and the cause of his losing reputation, with some other particulars. They are divided into the different classes of writing, oratory, and other contrivances for being great. I first examined the authors, who led me into speculations on the instability of a writer's fame, and on the causes by which a work full of genius last year has now no merit, and that without any apparent change, except that twelve months have elapsed. ”

“ Like figures conceived by Rembrandt or Rodin, they appeal to us with patience and resignation, and he bids the nimble-footed crowd gaze on these their fellows whose feet are so slow that from age to age they seem to have advanced no more than statues. ”

“ At these exhibitions preliminary to the big auction sales of venerable masters, and of middle-aged masters, and of venerable and middle-aged not-quite-masters, there is a very attractive class of people, a class of funny-looking, fine-looking people, a class, that is, of rather shabby-looking people who look as if they might be very rich, of dull-looking people who look as if they might be very bright. ”

“ These portraits, though mere sketches, must be valued as attempts in the very highest kind of narrative, which not only has very few examples to exhibit of any success, but very few competitors in the attempt. The word Character is in all mouths; it is a force which we all feel ”

“ Plain living, high thinking, and noble doing were the three guiding stars of his life. If he had had ambition, an illustrious public career was within his reach. He was an orator of no mean power, a brilliant and industrious man. ”

“ In my service and European social experience I had come to look upon presentations as reserved for making known individuals of lesser rank to some personality particularly distinguished, whether for high achievement or royal birth, or possibly age and dignity, as in the case of grandparents of the house. ”

“ The figures are by one of your own hired servants, by Bishop Fisher, and may save you some trouble in making the calculation for yourself, for mankind are not easily counted—there are always so many of them from home, and so many of them in bed, and so many of them you are apt to mistake for apes and so many for pigs. ”

“ If we compare the number of those who achieved noteworthiness through their own exertions with the numbers of the greatly more numerous persons whose names are registered in legal, clerical, medical, official, military, and naval directories, or in those of the titled classes [A] and landed gentry, or lastly, of those of the immense commercial world, the proportion of one noteworthy person to one hundred of the generality who were equally well circumstanced as himself does not seem to be an over-estimate. ”

“ It is, however, necessary that the sphere in which the personages of our story are about to act should be in some measure indicated, in order to facilitate the comprehension of their respective movements. ”

“ So it may be said that every figure painted by these higher artists looks an individual chosen among our species for nobility of bearing and beauty of countenance, and that their attitude and look strictly belong to them. ”

“ In order that the tendencies I have described should acquire their full force, it was necessary that they should be represented or illustrated in some great personage, who, by the splendour and the beauty of his career, could fascinate the imaginations of men. ”

“ The first may be given from various causes, independent of merit, and may be only temporary; while fame is the consolidated opinion of the best judges, increasing from year to year, till in the lapse of time it bears down, as it rolls along, the opposition which interest, prejudice, or fashion may have raised. The works of the best ancient masters stand on this firm foundation, and therefore ought to be the student’s chief study. ”